Submit your public comment to protect the Roadless Rule for National Parks by Sept. 19

Let's not beat around the bush, this administration wants to turn our National Parks into fossil fuels - his rush into rescinding the Roadless Rule is to create routes for logging trucks.

Please submit your public comment to protect the Roadless Rule by Sept. 19, they're only allowing 3 short weeks to consider something that took 3 years & hundreds of public meetings to enact.

Link to submit your comment here.

If it's helpful, as I know submitting comments/sending letters takes time - here are talking points from the Sierra Club & feel free to edit my public comment which is below.

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Do not rescind the roadless rule. This will harm the last truly wild places in the U.S. These areas are important for protecting wildlife, nature as it was meant to be, & they're also used for peaceful recreation.

When we go camping, fishing, hiking, etc. in these amazing national parks - they're beautiful, peaceful, & have clean water because they're untouched by human industry. Roads will bring logging & harm wildlife - that would be an irreversible tragedy.

The roads for improved forest fire fighting argument is a Trojan horse for logging. This is the only reason this administration is interested in National Parks, to use them as a fossil fuel resource. It's short-sighted & will harm one of the major elements that makes the United States unique, its wild spaces.

This action will harm wildlife today & harm the people of the United States in the future due to harming wildlife & the environment. Do not rescind the Roadless Rule, be on the right side of history, & do not support this environmental tragedy.

You are allowing only 21 days of public comments - why the rush? Have some hot deals waiting with the logging industry?

If the roadless rule truly needs to be adjusted for forest management (although the current policy already allows for forest management), then do it in a proper manner that considers realistic environmental needs & in a reasonable amount of time. Rushing through this is irreversible in our lifetimes, I oppose it & I imagine most U.S. citizens do too. Be wise, not greedy - do not rescind the Roadless Rule for National Parks.

From experts:

"From a hunting and angling perspective, the Roadless Rule [rollback] is problematic because the mid-elevation forestlands that are targeted for the rescission are the very ones where most of us hunt and fish. One of the factors that have made these lands so productive for wildlife is that there aren’t roads all over the place. Study after study indicates that fragmented habitat reduces security for big game like elk, mule deer, moose, and bighorn sheep.” - Outdoor Life

"For three years the U.S. Forest Service studied the effects of the rule and held 600 public meetings on the subject. By January 2000, a poll conducted by American Viewpoint, reported in the Wall Street Journal, found that 76 percent of Americans favored protection of roadless areas. The Forest Service received thousands of letters, 97 percent of them in favor of protecting roadless areas."

“The Roadless Rule is not just a policy—it’s a promise to future generations. It’s our shield against reckless logging, a guarantee that America’s wildest forests will remain sources of clean water, unparalleled recreation, thriving wildlife, and climate resilience. Dismantling it would be nothing short of a disaster for our people and our planet. America’s forests are not a piggy bank for timber companies. They are our natural savings account for clean water, recreation, wildlife, and climate stability."  -NRDC

"Although proponents of rolling back the Roadless Rule have suggested that this is somehow being done in response to wildfires, the reality is that this “solution' will lead to more wildfires. Research from The Wilderness Society, now in peer review, shows that from 1992-2024, wildfires were four times as likely to start in areas with roads than in roadless forest tracts. Another study showed that more than 90 percent of all wildfires nationwide occurred within half a mile of a road. 

More than 60 million Americans get their clean drinking water from our national forests, and roadless areas contain all or portions of 354 municipal watersheds. Roadless areas nationwide provide important habitat for fish and wildlife in our national forests, including more than 2,100 threatened, endangered, or sensitive animal and plant species." - Sierra Club

(Photo, Estes Park, CO taken by me)